The Black & Red

The late Miss Nora Corcoran of High St. told the following account of the origin of Newmarket’s club colours to the writer in the 1970’s. Nora was then retired but in earlier times her mother and herself ran a dressmaker’s shop at the top of High St. These may not be her exact words but the “voice” is as true to the original as the writer can recall:

In 1927 the local boys here in town felt they had the makings of a football team so they decided to call a meeting to progress the matter further. The meeting was held behind at Coolagh Bridge and a few other fellows from Taur and Kiskeam also attended. They felt they had as good a chance as any so they decided to go ahead and register their club and enter a team for the county championship.

They had no jerseys and, I suppose, as my brother Richard was their goalie they called up to us to see what we could do. Now, every dressmaker’s shop at that time had a plentiful supply of black material – all the old women and widows wore black. We had just made a dance frock for a local girl and we had a nice little remnant of red material left over. I unrolled some black material along the counter and I held a strip of the red remnant across it. “Now, don’t they go very well together”, said I, and they all agreed. They said they looked very nice and they ordered a set of them there on the spot. That is where the black and red colours came from. And they did very well, I think, didn’t they get to the county final?

Such was the humble origin of our club colours and through cheers and tears we wear them with pride. Nora died tragically in a house fire some years ago and at her funeral her coffin was draped with the Black & Red. Club members acted as pallbearers and formed a guard of honour at the funeral home and the church. She was the first woman so honoured.